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All Hazleton Area properties pay library tax

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Property owners in the Hazleton Area School District who don't pay their annual tax bill are still liable for the local library tax.

As some property owners in Schuylkill County learned last year, even if their property qualifies for Homestead tax exclusion and they owe little or no property tax to the school district, they still have to pay the library tax.

Commercial and industrial properties located in Keystone Opportunity Zones enjoy 10 years of abated state, county and school taxes as an incentive to economic development, but they still have to pay the library tax.

At a school board finance committee meeting this week, Business Manager Tony Ryba said properties who are turned over to the tax claim bureau for delinquency are also required to settle their library tax debt.

But because there is a significant amount of clerical work involved when the tax claim bureau has to separate out a library percentage when a delinquent property is sold at auction, Ryba advised the school board to assign a penalty percentage that will be added to the delinquent tax.

"When delinquent taxes are turned over to the tax claim bureau, it's a lot of work for the bureau to go through every case and separate out the library tax," Ryba said.

"It's a lot of work for not a lot of money, so we're looking to set a percentage for delinquents," he said.

In discussions on the recommendation, the board seemed to agree that 2.2 to 2.25 percent would likely be the delinquent penalty put to a board vote next week.

The Hazleton Public Library and its satellite branches in Freeland, Nuremberg, South Side and the Conyngham Valley receive the majority of its funding through school district tax revenues. In recent years, budgetary difficulties forced the school board to reduce library funding, which in turn threatened a reduction in library programs and services and possible closure of satellite branches.

Last year, the district asked voters to decide through a primary election ballot referendum whether a specific percentage of district tax revenues should be designated specifically to the public library system in effort to ensure consistent funding for the institution.

The referendum was approved by the voters, establishing a real estate tax levied by the Hazleton Area School District establishing an annual assessment of 0.1879 mills in Luzerne County ($0.1879 per every $1,000 of assessed real property value), 0.6381 mills in Schuylkill County ($0.6381 per every $1,000 of assessed value) and 0.6092 mills in Carbon County ($0.6092 per every $1,000 of assessed value) on taxable real estate located within the Hazleton Area School District.

Some Schuylkill County property owners in the district who qualified for the Homestead tax exclusion last year received a separate bill for the library tax.

In Luzerne and Carbon counties, the agencies that prepare residential tax bills have specialized computer software that will separate the library's portion of the tax bill from the school district's portion. But Schuylkill County does not have the special software.

Ryba said the Schuylkill glitch had no effect on property owners whose annual property tax bill is $370 or more last year because, even if they qualified for the Homestead tax exemption, which was $369 last year, the district was able to separate the library's portion of the payment.

But Schuylkill property owners with a school tax bill of $369 or less who didn't pay property taxes because they qualified for the Homestead exemption were still required to pay their share of the library tax. Those property owners received a separate bill for the library portion of the tax.

The Schuylkill County glitch affected about 130 properties.

The amount due was relatively small, but it had to be paid because the library tax became law when voters of the school district approved it.

The board will vote on the tax delinquent library tax penalty percentage at its regular meeting Tuesday.

mlight@standardspeaker.com

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